Anyone using Duelund VSF capacitor in Merlin VSM

g, i wrote the break in sheet that accompanies the master products before we had to change how the mbam's were made.
the original proto-type had the caps wired directly to the input jacks to minimize solder connections and pc board issues. but after having my prototype shipped back to me we encountered an issue with damaged caps. so we now solder them to the board and run a three inch piece of cardas to them. what you are hearing is this new piece of wire and additional solder joints needing burn in. up to 120 hours there were significant improvments evident so i am still expecting that you will hear more especially in the way of realism and a truly relaxed inviting nature.
have fun.
b

Turboglo,

Thanks for leaving your listening impressions as promised. I agree with all of your observations. I think you are right on the mark about hearing and listening in new ways as well.

The speaker is so relaxed and resolving that it just disappears and the music flows. For me, it has brought me closer in chasing my 40 year dream of my own piece of the absolute sound. Very exciting indeed.

My experience says to "hang onto your hat" as your sound will continue to evolve and improve over the next 100 hours.

Bobby has just hit the freaking ball so far out of the park with this upgrade it isn't even funny :-)

Hi all,

I just wanted to chime in about the Master BAM upgrades. I purchased a new pair of VSM-MXe from Bobby which I've been using for the past 1+ year. They replaced Dynaudio C1 monitors which were nice but needed much more power to get them going. The Merlins sound great with tube amps and don't need much power. I actually am currently using an Art Audio PX25 amp which only puts out 6 watts. I still have pretty good bass and plenty loudness in a room about 12x25x8 ft.

I was using the balanced BAM unit between a phonostage and my linestage, and a single ended BAM unit between my digital source (Modwright Transporter_ and the linestage). I sent the single ended BAM for master BAM upgrades and received the unit and Master RC's back last week.

I'm now using the Master BAM between the linestage and the poweramp, so that both digital and analog sources can use the BAM ( I don't have a tape loop in my preamp). Even though this configuration is not as recommended by Bobby, it sounds great where the previous BAM unit did not sound good after the linestage.

After so far probably about 15 hrs., I can attest to the above posters, better black background, better delineation of instruments/voices, increased size of instruments and stage height - I now notice on some recordings the voices actually coming from a height significantly above the speaker drivers, as if the person were actually standing up in front of the mic. Also most suprisingly, as I didn't expect this, the bass definition has improved and become more well delineated. The overall bass quality is shocking coming from a two-way 6.5" speaker, and especially with 6 watts pushing them.

Sounds like another plug for the Merlins but the Master BAM makes a speaker that was already amazing and turns it into a speaker that sounds better and suits me better than any number of speakers I have listened to, which cost up to 40k. None of the speakers I've heard have the overall righteous sound of the Merlins.

My system:

Merlin VSM-MXe
Nirvana SX-Ltd speaker cables
Einstein tube MKII linestage
Einstein balanced phonostage
Modwright Transporter source
Nottingham space 294 table with SME312 arm, Lyra Skala
Antipodes Audio Reference interconnects
Stealth hyperphono phono cable

"My experience says to "hang onto your hat" as your sound will continue to evolve and improve over the next 100 hours."

Thanks for the warning!

Cfchew wrote, ". . . as if the person were actually standing up in front of the mic."

Yes, I've heard the same thing. It's almost eerie!